After the sprint of the Chinese Grand Prix, a sense of surprise hung in the air, but McLaren, announced as the favorite before the season, did everything possible to prevent this from happening.
Q1 brought a real colorful spectacle, as, with a slight exaggeration, the entire grid turned over in the top 3. McLaren, Red Bull Racing, Racing Bulls led, and in the end Lando Norris, Isaac Hadjar and Yuki Tsunoda finished this stage in the first places. Pierre Gasly, Ollie Bearman, Jack Doohan, Gabriel Bortoleto and Liam Lawson did not have the same luck, being eliminated from the fight. The last driver had a painfully poor performance, and his boss gave him only one piece of advice before qualifying: to avoid social networks...
In Q2, things went similarly to the previous stage, after a brief clash between Mercedes, McLaren quickly took the initiative and never relinquished it. Once again, Lando Norris proved to be the fastest, ahead of Max Verstappen and Oscar Piastri, while Esteban Ocon, Nico Hülkenberg, Carlos Sainz and the two Aston Martins joined the eliminated.
After the first fast laps in Q3, we saw the same picture again: the two McLarens were in the lead, closely followed by Verstappen. At this stage, it was almost obvious that the orange team would get pole position, the only question was which driver would do it with which car. In the end, Oscar Piastri managed to finish first, ahead of George Russell and Lando Norris. The finish was extremely close, we hope these emotions will remain for tomorrow's Chinese Grand Prix!
Photo: Motorsportweek / PlanetF1
